


Internal Secrets: A Reylo One-Shot

by KCMarsala



Series: Reylo One Shots [2]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-17
Updated: 2018-02-17
Packaged: 2019-03-20 11:29:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13716762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KCMarsala/pseuds/KCMarsala
Summary: This one-shot follows some time after the events of "The Last Jedi." The First Order having suffered major blows and the Resistance gaining in strength, the war seems all but over. But when Kylo Ren shows up at the Resistance Headquarters, Rey realizes she's never been privy to all the secrets.Warning... This is LONG! lol





	Internal Secrets: A Reylo One-Shot

Rey jerked in surprise when she saw him. It had been so long, _so_ long since she’d figured out how to block him from her consciousness and she’d grown so accustomed to doing so that she had long since stopped noticing she was even doing it. In fact, she’d even begun to wonder at times if he was dead. But there he was, appearing just as solid as the last time she’d seen him over two years ago through that damn connection they shared. She remembered that last time, remembered the expression of sorrow he wore as she told him she’d figured out his secret. She had accepted that they were bound in the Force, and that gave her control over it. She’d been helpless to resist the temptation to rub his nose in it, to tell him to his Force-connected-image-of-a-face that she refused to permit the emotional link the bond seemed to engender, to point out that he would no longer be able to pop in on her mind unannounced, read her feelings, or see her image. She had learned how to control that, and she’d informed him that she would. And she did, right then, without even allowing him one last word to her.

That was the last time she’d seen his face. Of course, she’d met him on the battlefield, but he’d always been behind that ridiculous mask, for which she’d found herself grateful. She had hardened her heart against him, allowing herself to be consumed only by the need to destroy him whenever their paths had crossed. And she’d never missed the fact that he only ever defended himself, never attacked her. For more than a year, only one of them had been out for blood, though she’d never been able to draw enough of it. And then, abruptly, he’d disappeared. Battles were still fought and she was always there in the thick of it all, watching and waiting for his appearance, but it never came. It was then she’d wondered if he was dead, though she’d never cared enough to open that long sealed gateway between their minds to find out if her supposition were true. She was just as content imagining his bloodied, torn, mangled carcass on some rocky outcropping in some distant system. These were the thoughts that made her happy and, as long as he continued not showing up on the battlefield, she was just as happy to assume they were true.

It had been about that time that things started changing. The Resistance had always been the underdog, scrambling for people, weapons, ships, supplies, even hope at times just to stay alive. The First Order was simply far better funded than the Resistance and, while stormtroopers may have been notoriously bad shots, there were _a lot_ of them. And ground assault vehicles and aerial bombers didn’t need to have good aim in order to rain havoc down on the Resistance, which they had done consistently…until they didn’t. Now, just under a year later, the First Order’s forces appeared to be both smaller and less effective. Eventually, Resistance leaders got wind of the fact that the enemy had been afflicted by sabotage and manufacturing mishaps that had severely hindered their numbers and productivity. Rey recalled secretly imagining the man-child tantrums such news had likely evoked in their Supreme Leader, delighting in the angst those losses surely caused him, assuming he was still alive.

And, at the same time the First Order was losing ground, the Resistance was gaining. News of Finn’s defection had finally permeated the stormtrooper ranks and they started changing sides in droves. Rey had greeted every turned First Order trooper with a broad smile that only she knew was actually a gloat secretly aimed at _him_ , then promptly sent them on their way to target training. The inexplicable explosions at weapons and ship assembly facilities eventually convinced manufacturers that working with the First Order was simply bad for business, and the Resistance found themselves flush with deals for all kinds of equipment and ships at prices they had never before imagined. And, slowly but surely, the tables had turned. No longer was the First Order the dominant force in the galactic war, and no longer was the Resistance little more than a nuisance. In the past several weeks, it had become more and more clear that the war was nearing its conclusion, and that the Resistance would see the end of the First Order.

So why of all damnable times, would Supreme Leader Kylo Ren choose now to break through her mental barrier and appear to her through this stupid, blasted, ridiculous Force bond she’d never found the ability to truly sever?

Even though he’d met her gaze across the crowded mess hall, she turned resolutely away, refusing to acknowledge him. Although she tried to reinforce the barrier against him, it had no effect and she could still see him as clearly as if he were actually there, standing there incongruously in a pair of black pants and a green shirt, of all things. Gritting her teeth angrily, she stabbed at her plate, the food suddenly appearing terribly unappealing to her, only able to hope that at least enough of the barrier remained that maybe at least she wouldn’t have to hear his voice.

“What’s wrong?”

Rey looked up sheepishly, her mouth quirking in a lopsided twist as she regarded Poe. Unable to keep her eyes from flicking out toward Ren once more, she pushed air forcefully out of her lungs and forced a smile to her face that she was certain was quite grotesque.

“Nothing,” she told him, even though she knew he would know it was a complete lie.

“You were smiling and laughing just a minute again ago and then—”

Poe shook his head as he cut himself off, apparently realizing there was no point in trying to get her to open up to him when she clearly didn’t want to. He exhaled sharply and Rey had the sudden premonition that she wasn’t going to like what was about to come out of his mouth.

“Rey, there’s something I need to talk to you about,” he admitted with evident reluctance. “I should have before now, but I just didn’t know—”

“Poe…”

His eyes lifted from his half-eaten meal and met hers with apology in them as he heard her unspoken request to get to the damn point.

“It’s just…I know how well this went with Finn and—”

Before Poe’s words could even sink into her mind, Rey leapt up with a cry. Her gaze inexorably drawn back to Ren once more, she had finally noticed what her brain had refused to recognize before. He was talking to people, interacting with them, as in _they could see him_. She hadn’t been able to keep him from appearing through their bond because he wasn’t appearing through their bond.

 _He was actually. Fucking. Here_.

She stood there, her eyes wild with anger and alarm, her stance ready for battle, and her fingers itching to grab and ignite the dual bladed lightsaber at her hip. Her body vibrated with tension as she stared at him in confusion and disbelief, as he stared back at her with resignation and calm, evidently having fully expected her reaction. As well he should, the vile snake.

“Aw, _shit_.”

Rey heard Poe’s muttered curse and she turned her head slightly toward him, but she couldn’t peel her eyes from Ren, knowing he’d take the very moment of her distraction to launch the attack he was clearly here to make. There were far too many people crowding the mess hall for her to allow him to do this here. She needed to bide her time, to wait and lure him out into the open where she could ignite her lightsaber and drive it through his black heart. The last thing she expected was for Poe to jump up in front of her, his hands splayed out before him, drawing her attention and impeding her visual lock on the enemy.

“Rey,” he said, his voice urgent. “Rey, listen to me. He’s not a threat. That’s what I needed to tell you.”

“What?!” she shouted, beyond caring that nearly every eye in the hall, even had its owner been oblivious to the abrupt tension in the room beforehand, now turned toward her. “You _knew_ he was coming here?”

“That was the agreement—”

“What?!” she shouted again, even louder.

And that’s when Poe had had enough.

“Outside, Colonel,” he commanded in his best General voice, making it clear he was now pulling rank on her. “ _Now_.”

Not bothering to wait for her compliance, he turned and headed toward the nearest door. Rey gawked and fumed in rage when Poe gestured toward Ren and he obediently followed him through the same door, leaving her awkwardly among all the gazes still focused on her in curiosity. Feeling suddenly as though she’d like to indulge in one of the childish, destructive tantrums Ren himself was fond of according to several of the defected stormtroopers, Rey contented herself with a vicious swear under her breath as she turned on her heel and followed _him_.

Making her way through the hangar and eventually out into the bright daylight, Rey glanced about for a moment before she spotted the two men in a heated exchange on the far side of the landing field. Striding with heated energy of her own toward them, she realized the anger and frustration was coming entirely from Ren, while Poe seemed to be engaged in a more placating, even _apologetic_ manner.

“What the hell, Dameron?” she demanded as she approached.

Both men turned to regard her as she came to a halt with her arms folded tight and aggressive across her chest. Rey studiously avoided Ren’s gaze, glaring with infinite focus at Poe.

“His coming here was always part of the agreement—”

“ _What_ agreement?” she interrupted him imperiously. “I don’t know about any agreement.”

Poe nodded with an air of guilt. “That was part of the agreement too.”

“I knew you wouldn’t—”

Rey swiftly called her saber to her hand and held it at Ren’s chin, effectively halting his attempt toward explanation. She glared harshly into his eyes, pressing her thumb hard against the casing next to the ignition switch so she wasn’t irrepressibly tempted to press the actual switch.

“You,” she grated at him, her voice low, harsh, and intense, “don’t get to speak. Or I get to ignite this blade. Got it?”

She watched as his eyes, dark with awareness of her deep desire to kill him right here and now, fixed intently on her, a glimmer of his own anger flaring in their depths. He nodded once, and Rey stifled the disappointment that she couldn’t even use the excuse of his verbal acquiescence to replace his jaw with a gaping, glowing hole. Holding his attention a moment longer, she slowly withdrew her weapon and returned it to the clip at her waist. Even then, she still held his gaze, her chest heaving with the nearly overwhelming desire to kill him now. She wasn’t even certain why she didn’t. She didn’t know what this agreement was, despite that she’d been a key member of the Resistance’s highest command for nearly two years now. A tangle of emotions was already roaring its way through her mind and body, chief among them a deep and abiding sense of betrayal.

Rey turned on Poe, glaring at him with a fiery wrath. And she knew he understood, because he lowered his gaze and shuffled his feet. But before he could say anything, Rey sensed a new presence and her head jerked around an instant after she saw Ren’s head lift in the same direction. General Organa approached.

“Poe, take Ben inside,” she instructed, her voice impeccably calm. “Let me talk to Rey.”

Rey reacted viscerally to Leia referring to her son as Ben. Clenching her wrists and consumed by so much rage she didn’t know what to do with it all, Rey could only lock her jaw against any commentary she might be inclined to make as the two men silently accepted the senior general’s order. Rey was only too aware of Ren attempting to catch her gaze as he turned slowly away, but she steadfastly denied him, her eyes riveted upon the gravel at her feet as they retreated.

Once they were gone, Rey looked at Leia, the woman she’d come to regard as a mother, and felt the horrible sense of betrayal weighing painfully against her heart, displacing some measure of the anger that had dominated her since she realized Poe hadn’t been surprised by Ren’s casual appearance in the Resistance Headquarters mess hall.

“I know you’re angry,” Leia began calmly, to which Rey could only turn her face aside harshly as she struggled to contain sudden tears. “This was a hard decision for me to make, Rey. Even harder to enforce. But I knew it was right for the Resistance. And I know you’ll understand that once you’ve had some time to think about it.”

Not trusting her voice, Rey gave a quick jerk of her head, duly noting her acknowledgement if not acceptance of Leia’s preamble. Leia took a deep breath.

“Ben has been working with us for the past year.”

Rey felt the air vacate her lungs and a stifled cry escaped her throat as her composure collapsed. Her shoulders hunched over as her core contracted painfully, and she stumbled away from the general until her legs could no longer support her weight and she fell to her knees. Tears slipped silently from her eyes as her mind skittered over the events of the last year and rapidly, instinctively made sense of it all. How could she not see it? How had she been so very, horribly, utterly blind?

“He has been sabotaging the First Order from the inside,” Leia murmured gently, her hand laying against Rey’s shoulder as she knelt beside her, “spreading dissent among the ranks, clandestinely making it known the Resistance would welcome all deserters and providing safe routes of egress, setting bombs at manufacturing facilities, eliminating key members of command… If you can imagine it, he’s done it.”

“No,” she insisted, suddenly finding her voice. “No, that’s impossible. He’s lying to you. It’s all a lie.”

“It’s not, Rey. We’ve seen too much proof of it, over and over, for a full year. The war is effectively over, and it’s because of him.”

As much as she wanted to, she couldn’t truthfully refute the evidence. She’d never been entirely comfortable with the explanations that had been provided for the Resistance’s good fortune over the past several months. At the time, she’d thought it was because she knew all the secrets of the Resistance high command and knew none of it explained the phenomena they were seeing. Of course, now she knew it was because she hadn’t known nearly as much as she’d thought she did.

“He came to us with this,” Leia continued, her voice still calm and mild. “Well, to me. He explained what he wanted to do and he demanded only a few things in return. That he would be allowed to join the Resistance openly once his duplicity was uncovered, and—”

“That I be kept in the dark,” Rey concluded intuitively.

Leia nodded. “I brought Poe in on it, and together he and I decided only the two of us would know. Once we received word he’d been compromised, Poe was supposed to let you and Finn know. I told Chewie.”

“We’re the only ones who had ever seen his face,” Rey realized, quickly putting the pieces together. “No one else even knows he’s Kylo Ren.”

“Rey,” Leia sighed gently, her voice even softer than before. “He’s not Kylo Ren. Not anymore. He’s my son, Ben Solo. I need you to accept that. You can’t refer to him as Ren.”

Rey shook her head with increasing fervency, pushing herself away from Leia as she stumbled to her feet.

“No, I can’t do that. I won’t. It’s a lie. I won’t participate in this farce.”

“You have to, Rey,” Leia stated with conviction, standing and forcing Rey to meet her gaze. “If you reveal that he was Kylo Ren, the First Order defectors will retaliate against him. We’ll have chaos and distrust in our ranks, and we can’t have that. You know we can’t.”

“But you can have it with me and Finn and Chewie,” she accused scathingly.

Leia hung her head. “We didn’t have a choice. And you don’t either. You’ll see that once you’ve had a chance to calm down and think this through.”

Rey turned away, her jaw clamped shut tight. The truth was that she already recognized that she couldn’t afford to go blabbing off about Ben Solo’s real identity, not if she valued the Resistance and what it stood for, which she did. She already recognized that the greatest threat in this respect actually lay with Finn, since he’d never been terribly good at withholding his more destructive impulses. And she already knew it was going to have to be her who convinced him to keep his mouth shut. But she just wasn’t ready to admit any of that aloud. It was hard enough admitting it silently in the privacy of her own head.

“Why?”

Leia lifted her head at Rey’s sudden question, clearly pulling herself out of her own well of thoughts.

“Why what?”

“Why did he want to do this?” Rey demanded, her tone still harsh and unforgiving. “He had to have given you a pretty compelling reason to convince you he meant what he said.”

To Rey’s surprise, Leia actually had to smother a hint of a smile, but the expression was so fleeting that Rey was immediately uncertain she’d even seen what she thought she had. Before she knew it, the general’s previous expression of grim determination was fixed upon her face, with no hint of anything else lurking beneath.

“He did,” Leia assured her. “But that was also his third demand. No one knows his reason other than me, and it will die with me. Just like I did with Poe and Chewbacca, I have to ask you to have faith in me, in my judgment.”

Rey turned her back on the general once again, recognizing the words she hadn’t spoken yet nevertheless intended: that she would have to have faith in _him_. Angling her face toward the lowering sun, Rey vowed she would never trust him, but she would honor Leia’s wishes. And she’d tell her that tomorrow.

“How did Chewie react?”

“Much the same as you,” Leia sighed softly. “But he said that if I could forgive Ben, then he would try.”

 _Han_ …

Rey bowed her head. Although it had been two and a half years, the image of Kylo Ren running his disgusting, spitting saber through his father’s beating heart was still vivid in her memory. Privately, she felt certain Leia could only forgive her son because she hadn’t been there to see it like she and Chewie had. Then again, it was the love of _her_ life who had died by her son’s hand, not hers or Chewie’s.

“I need…time,” Rey finally murmured.

“I understand,” Leia agreed readily from behind her turned back. “I can give you a day. Then I’ll need your commitment to silence.”

It didn’t escape Rey’s notice that the general wasn’t giving her a choice. Either she agreed to bury and never speak of Ben Solo’s history as Kylo Ren or… Or what? She wasn’t sure, and she didn’t feel brave enough to ask.

Rey nodded, turning only far enough to ensure that Leia saw and acknowledged her agreement, then slowly walked off. Wandering alone aimlessly for a long time, lost in her thoughts, eventually Rey found herself at the edge of the landing field, sitting in the thick grass just beyond the gravel, her knees tucked up tight to her chest as she stared into the deepening sky. It wasn’t until the first stars peeked out that she sensed someone coming up behind her. Turning sharply, she smiled ruefully as Finn and Chewbacca took up flanking positions on either side of her. After a time, Rey sighed.

“Quite the trio, aren’t we?” she muttered.

Chewie chuffed softly. _Yeah, we are_.

“Did you agree?” Finn asked suddenly, as though he’d been holding the burning question back since he’d arrived. “To keep quiet, I mean.”

 _Yes_.

“Yes, he did,” Rey translated for Finn.

Finn nodded. “You?”

Rey sighed, still not feeling ready to admit this out loud, but knowing she had to. “Not yet.”

Finn’s reaction was immediate and predictable. “Rey, how could you? I mean, Chewie, I get.”

 _Hey!_ the Wookie grumbled aggressively.

“Not because you’re weak or anything, big guy,” Finn interjected, quickly surmising the meaning behind Chewie’s objection. “Because he grew up with you. But he tried to kill us. Almost did kill me!”

Hating herself for having to do this and cursing Leia — _and_ Kylo Ren _—_ for forcing her to, she challenged Finn.

“Is your own personal vendetta worth destroying the Resistance?”

Finn stared, his stunned gaze wavering between Rey’s steady one and the Wookie seated on the far side of her. “Are you serious?”

“Yes, Finn. We have to do this,” she told him wearily. “Otherwise, there’s no place for us here.”

“What?” he hissed.

“He’s her son, Finn. She’s not going to kick him out. And if he goes, she’s going to go with him, and you know we can’t lose her, not when we’re about to win this whole damn thing.”

“So we’re expendable?”

Rey breathed slowly and deeply, stifling the rage that clawed deep inside her and wanted out. “Compared to him…? Yeah,” she muttered, not entirely able to keep the bitterness out of her tone. “Completely expendable.”

Rey stared out at the last traces of pink against the horizon, gritting her teeth so hard she could feel the grinding sensation in her skull. She couldn’t believe what she’d been brought to, forced to concede that Kylo Ren was more essential to the survival of the Resistance than she was, after everything she’d done, everything she’d lost for the cause. Bitterly, she thought of a passage she’d read in one of the Jedi texts about altered memories. She wished she’d had a chance to learn from Master Luke how to do that before he’d died, but she didn’t dare experiment, the texts having provided cautionary tales of such skills gone wrong. She didn’t relish the idea of spending the rest of her life believing she was a Porg.

_Of course…_

Rey shook her head sharply, negating the thought as quickly as it formed.She’d be damned if she would ask Ren to remove her memories of him. She didn’t want that black fiend anywhere near her mind, especially not her memories.

“I’m telling Leia tomorrow that I agree to keep quiet about… _him_ ,” Rey told Finn suddenly. “You need to as well.”

Finn’s expression turned furious, but he kept his mouth shut. Rey knew he wanted to object, to assert his independence of will and argue that he could blab as long and as loud as he wanted about Kylo Ren now being a member of the Resistance, consequences be damned. But instead, he just looked at her sourly.

“You can’t even say his name.”

Rey sighed wearily, because Finn was entirely right. “I’ll call him Solo.”

She’d thought that would be preferable to _Ben_ , that she could somehow fool herself into believing she didn’t truly think he wasn’t Kylo Ren if she refused to use his given name. But she knew the moment the name left her mouth that it would hit Finn in exactly the wrong way, _Solo_ being what Finn had taken to calling Han during their all-too-brief acquaintance.

“I can’t do that.”

Rey stood up abruptly, really not needing yet another reminder of Han today. “You do what you need to, Finn. I gotta go.”

Before either Finn or Chewie could say anything, Rey ran off, feeling the tears coming hot and heavy and needing to get away before they overtook her. She managed to make it to her quarters before she lost the battle with her emotions and cried herself to sleep.

When she awoke after a long and restless night, she quickly sought Leia out.

“Alright, I agree,” Rey stated loudly and firmly in the command center, not having bothered to announce her presence or even gain Leia’s attention before spitting the loathsome words through her mouth.

Leia turned around slowly and regarded Rey with relief in her eyes. “Thank you, Rey.”

“Would you have really kicked me out if I’d refused?” she asked, her voice lower now.

She watched as the general stifled an amused smile. “I knew it wouldn’t come to that.”

Rey smirked, not at all liking the implications of her words. With a brisk nod, she turned aside.

Having slept rather late and lost her appetite the previous evening, Rey was feeling quite hungry and made her way to the mess hall. Assembling a meal of both breakfast and mid-day options, she settled at an empty table. Midway through her meal, she saw Finn enter, looking as bleary-eyed as she felt. Apparently he hadn’t had any better of a night that she had. They both nodded grimly at each other, and Finn joined her at her table. Neither of them feeling up for conversation, they sat in moody but companionable silence as they worked though their plates

A chatty group had formed at the next table over and, eventually Rey determined that they were from a relatively recent batch of former stormtroopers. She could always recognize the new ones, because they spent most of their time comparing life here with life in the First Order. Listening to the realities of the life of a stormtrooper, Rey was always amazed there had never been any defections before Finn. He’d tried to explain how the conditioning normally eliminated any thoughts of individualism, but she still didn’t understand. And now she wondered how Kylo Ren— _Solo_. Ugh, that was going to be so hard to get used to—how _Solo_ had managed to change that attitude among so many of them. She was curious, but she also realized quite quickly that if the only way to satisfy her curiosity was to ask him, she’d rather remain ignorant.

As if summoned by her thoughts, he entered the mess hall. Stifling a grunt of annoyance, Rey felt more than saw him pause and notice her presence, but she did see Finn’s head lift then turn toward her out of her peripheral view. Taking her cue to focus solely on what remained of her meal, Finn bowed his head without comment.

“Oh, hey, Ben!”

Rey felt her ears perk up as an occupant of the adjacent table greeted him without knowing he’d once lorded over them all through fear and intimidation. She took perverse delight in imagining how the former trooper’s attitude toward him would change were she to know the truth.

“Who’s that?” one of her dining companions asked.

“New guy. He got here yesterday.”

“Was he a trooper?”

Rey couldn’t help but glance toward Finn at that, and she caught his eye from the corner of hers.

“I don’t know where he came from, but it wasn’t the First Order.”

“Actually,” a third voice spoke up, “he’s the general’s son.”

A general cacophony of surprise arose from the table until one spoke up louder than the others.

“Wait… Which general?”

The third speaker laughed. “Does Dameron really look old enough for that to you? Organa, you idiot!”

“I didn’t know she had a son.”

“No one did. They sent him away when he was little. Some desert planet. Jakra, or something like that. He used to scavenge old Imperial wreckages.”

Rey dropped her fork and it clattered loudly against the table. Sitting back abruptly, she shoved her hands down into her lap and focused hard and the splatter of food that had leapt off her plate, her face reddening with fury. He’d stolen her history?! Gripping her hand into fists, she forced herself to recognize Leia had probably had some influence in that, knowing that they had purposely cultivated an alternative history for her in order to add to her mystique among the Resistance troops as the last Jedi. Sure, it made sense, considering they couldn’t reveal _his_ actual background, but it was _her_ lonely and harsh history, _not_ his.

Rey felt Finn’s hand cover hers under cover of the table, and she welcomed his silent support, he, of course, knowing who really had been the scavenger from Jakku. With a deep, surreptitious breath, Rey gave his hand one quick squeeze, then placed her hands on the table. The adjacent group had already resumed their conversation and, unable to help herself, Rey saw that Ren—Damnit, no!— _Solo_ had already taken up position on the far side of the mostly empty room. She was gratified that he’d chosen a seat nearly as far as possible from her, but any feeling of goodwill was summarily negated by the fact that she caught him watching her across the distance. Gritting her teeth and feeling her cheeks flush with anger again, she looked down at her food and realized she’d lost her appetite yet again.

Setting her flatware and napkin on the plate and downing the last of her water, she noticed Finn’s narrowed gaze directed across the room as she turned to stand. Following his sightline, she saw Solo rise to greet a blond woman she didn’t recognize. Observing him greet the woman who was nearly as tall as him with a brief embrace, Rey was just wondering who she was when Finn erupted beside her.

“Oh, _hell_ no!”

Rey stood abruptly alongside Finn as his outburst drew every eye in the room, including _theirs_.

“Keeping my mouth shut is one thing,” Finn shouted in greater fury than she’d ever seen from him, “but I did _not_ agree to _that_!”

Rey turned to look at the woman once again, confirming that she didn’t know who she was. But that wasn’t particularly surprising, considering she’d spent so little time among the First Order and really only “met” Ren and Snoke. As she pondered, though, Finn left her side and she realized in alarm that he now stood at the edge of table populated by former stormtroopers.

“Do you know who that is?” he questioned hotly, flinging his arm out to point at the pair on the far side of the hall.

“Finn!” Rey shouted, rushing to his side but failing to reach him before he’d dropped his bombshell.

“That’s Captain Phasma!”

Rey gripped Finn’s shoulders just as he realized his revelation hadn’t had the effect he’d expected. He stared at them in disbelief as they traded exclamations of excitement and enthusiasm, and one even jumped up and hurried over to the woman in question to shake her hand. Rey had just started to pull Finn away from the group when one made a comment that froze her.

“I guess she was just as terrified by Ren as well all were, huh?”

“I always thought she got along with him very well. I mean, _very_ well, you know?”

“You think any of those knights have switched sides?”

“Shit, no. Those guys are evil through and through. They’ll _never_ turn.”

Under her hands, Rey felt Finn’s muscles tense and she pulled him firmly away before he could say anything else. Leading him by his shoulders, they made their way as quickly as possible toward the only door, which unfortunately brought them closer to the couple Rey most wanted to avoid. Deliberately turning her head away from them, she was surprised to hear him call out her name. Coming to an abrupt halt, she turned to face him.

He stood six or seven paces from her, his eyes beseeching, as Phasma—whoever she was—stood a few paces behind him. Rey noticed Phasma’s gaze directed primarily at Finn, while _his_ —she still couldn’t bring herself to think of him by his first name—were fixed solely on her. She felt Finn fuming at her side, and knew he wouldn’t be able to contain himself much longer.

“Not now,” she told him firmly, turning to grip Finn’s shoulders again. On second consideration, she glanced back and added “Not ever” before guiding Finn through the door.

Rey and Finn quickly found Poe, and she left Finn there, arguing with him about why he hadn’t bothered to let him know Phasma had come along with the unmentionable one. Quickly deciding she wasn’t up for that drama just now, Rey excused herself and went and found an X-wing in need of repairs. She was elbow deep in grease and parts when an all-too-familiar voice interrupted her.

“Rey…”

She sighed heavily and went right back to ratcheting the socket into place. “Go away.”

“You can’t ignore me forever.”

“Yeah?” she challenged, still not bothering to even look his direction. “Watch me.”

She heard him sigh as she continued to do just what he’d said she couldn’t, but she was also hyperaware of the fact that he didn’t heed her instructions either. She could feel his efforts to think through the best course of action even though she knew her mental barriers were in place, and it was maddening. Neither of them had any greater access to the other than anyone else did, but just their proximity, their being physically in the same space, seemed to have her intuition pinging about what he was feeling. It was no more pronounced than when she could sense what Finn was feeling, but it was a thousand times worse since she really didn’t _want_ to know what he was feeling.

“There’s so few of us left now,” he began, and Rey ground her teeth together, “and I’ve had more guidance than you—”

Rey threw down her tool and rounded on him, getting into his face with both her attitude and her greasy finger pointing at him.

“You want to _teach_ me? Is that it?” she snarled, her voice stumbling to an awkward halt as she remembered at the last moment to omit his name. “It’s always about what you can _do_ for me, isn’t it? How you can _change_ me, make me better, _improve_ me, right? Well, _fuck you_ , R— _Solo_. I don’t need any improving.”

Retrieving her hastily discarded tool, she turned back to the half finished work but found her hands shaking so hard she couldn’t even get it attached properly to tighten the socket.

“Is that what you thought?” she heard him mutter behind her. “All this time?”

Frustrated beyond capacity by the fury that vibrated through her body and drove all semblance of logic out of her mind just by his presence, Rey gripped her hands at her hips and hung her head heavily, attempting to regain control of herself.

“I never wanted to change you. I wanted to help you.”

“Help?!” she cried, dismayed to find a tear streaking its way down her face. “You can help me by leaving me the fuck alone!”

Dropping the tool once again, she pushed her way past him while managing to keep her face hidden from him. Forced to wipe her tears on her shoulder since her hands were covered in grease, she quickly cleaned herself up, then hurried to the mess hall. Bypassing the usual service line, Rey made her way into the kitchen and to the secret stash Leia had once showed her in the furthest pantry. Secreted away in the back left corner, she grabbed one of the bottles of Corellian brandy, wondering if the general had revealed the location of the alcohol since she knew one day Rey would need it for just this purpose. Shoving the unwelcome thought and reminder of her mother figure’s betrayal aside, Rey hastily unsealed the bottle and ran from the hall, heedless of who might see her.

By the time she reached the grass beyond the landing field, she had already swigged down a third of the bottle, feeling its warmth in her belly. Kicking off her shoes, she stood with her toes in the cool grass and upended the bottle, gulping the burning liquid down. She embraced its fiery sensation beyond the point of discomfort, only relinquishing her mouth’s hold on the bottle when she needed to gulp down as much air as she had alcohol.

Another third of the bottle gone, Rey was disappointed to find she was still thinking so clearly. With a howl of rage and frustration, she took off running. She ran as far and as fast as she could, chasing the same sunset she had watched last night before Finn and Chewie had arrived. Eventually, the burn in her legs, the dizziness in her head, the heaving through her lungs, and the blindness behind her tears brought her to stop.

“Why!?” she wailed up into the sky, drops of brandy splattering her face as she flung her arms out and some liquid escape its glass confines.

Reminded of the contents, she guzzled again, noticing less of a burn this time but a distinct inability to remain standing in one, still position. Pausing now and then to take heaving breaths that were hindered both by her bouts of gulping and her gasping tears, she finished the rest of the bottle and threw it with a shout as she realized she had drained it and still didn’t feel any better.

“Why did you do this to me?!” she cried out into the deepening velvet of the night sky. “I didn’t want any of this! I didn’t ask for it!”

Stumbling about on her feet, Rey reached for and didn’t find her lightsaber. Only now realizing she hadn’t carried it all day, a distant part of her mind that was still capable of rational thought realized it was probably a good thing she didn’t have it right now. She was liable to take off her own hand at this stage in her inebriation.

So why didn’t the pain in her heart hurt any less?

“I had a family!” she cried, her voice already becoming hoarse with its abuse. “I finally had a family who loved me! But they’ve been lying to me for a year! It’s all false! Nothing was ever real!”

Her head spinning out of control, Rey staggered to the side then fell, catching herself on one hand and her hip. Tucking her knees under her, she leaned forward, her fingers digging into the soft, pungent earth as she wept bitterly. She wondered what her life would have been if she’d never had access to the Force. Would her parents still be alive? Would she be happy? Would she at least be in charge of her own damn destiny instead of always having it laid out for her? Crying out with renewed frustration, she arched back and screamed again at the sky.

“I don’t want it!” she shrieked hysterically, beating and tearing at herself as if to rip the Force sensitivity from her body. “Take it back! Take it away!”

Rey fell over backward then immediately curled into a ball, weeping anew. She wasn’t aware of his presence until he touched her shoulder, and yet it didn’t startle her either. It was like part of her knew he was supposed to be there and she didn’t resist when he lifted her into his arms. In fact, she clung to him, gripping his clothing and weeping bitterly into his chest.

“I don’t want you,” she moaned at him, pounding her fist against his chest and yet still clinging to him.

“I know you don’t,” he answered, his voice soft and oddly soothing.

Weeping in loud, unflattering sobs that shook her body and left her a blubbering mess, Rey pressed herself against him, refusing to think about how safe and protected she felt in his embrace. And, eventually, she slept. When she awoke, she found herself draped unashamedly along his side, one leg flung over his thigh, her cheek resting on his chest and her back cradled by his arm. She could feel his steady breath fluttering her hair and smell his scent surrounding her. Abruptly alarmed by how right it felt being with him like this, she pushed away from him. The lingering effects of the alcohol made her head swim and she pushed too hard, her body falling onto her opposite side. Suddenly, her uncontrolled spin was halted and she felt the warm pressure of his Force surrounding her, sparing her from a fall into the cold dirt and dew-soaked grass. She gasped at the sensation of all-encompassing safety, the feel of his Force essence both new and strangely familiar, comforting…beloved. She thought it was the most amazing sensation she’d ever felt, until his arms pierced the envelope he’d placed around her and gathered her back into his embrace.

“How did you find me?” she muttered.

“You’ve never been drunk before, have you?”

She twisted her lips in annoyance at his evasion of her question and felt the rumble of his laughter in his chest. She wondered just what he found so funny.

“You’ve dropped your mental shields,” he said, addressing both her spoken question as well as the unspoken one.

“Oh shit,” she hissed, immediately focusing inward to pull them back in place.

“Please don’t,” he asked, one hand coming up to cradle her head. “It’s been so long…”

Although she couldn’t have said why, Rey found herself leaving the barrier down. Tentatively, she touched the surface of her mind, the space where she was used to feeling the barrier between them, and was surprised to find his presence there. It was the same feeling she’d had when encased in a bubble of his Force essence, but a thousand times more appealing. How had she denied herself this for two years?

“I wondered that every day.”

Rey felt an unfamiliar ache at his murmured words, and she consciously decided not to pursue its meaning. Instead, she followed the trace of his essence in her mind, picking along a strand that led… _away_. She didn’t quite know where. Then, as the finger of her mind reached a certain point on that thread, her consciousness burst into a magnificently bright space, flush with dreams and aspirations and desires that were utterly foreign to her. Every nuance, every detail of this space appealed to her, called to her to accept it, choose it… _love_ it. And the intensity of it, while intoxicating, was also frightening. Pulling away both mentally and physically, Rey stifled an instinct to panic as she gazed directly at Ren for the first time.

“What was that?” she gasped breathlessly.

He actually smiled at her, a tender, affectionate, hopeful smile. “That was me. My consciousness.”

Her eyes widened. “But it was so… _bright_!”

“It didn’t used to be,” he admitted with a nod.

“It changed?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

He took a deep breath, and Rey somehow understood he was wondering if she was ready for this.

“No,” she admitted quickly. “I’m probably not.”

Moving with much greater care this time, Rey pushed herself out of Ren’s arms. Quickly missing the warmth and protective sensation of his embrace, Rey nevertheless stifled the urge to return to him. Instead, she crossed her legs in front of her, resting an elbow on one knee and her forehead in that hand.

“So,” she said, squinting her eyes as she struggled to remember what her question was. “You found me, how, precisely?”

“I followed your Force signature.”

“Like a trail?”

“Sort of. It pulls at me.”

She squinted again. “It _pulls_ at you?”

He nodded. “Yes. It always has. Just like mine pulls at you.”

Rey took a deep breath and looked away. She didn’t like knowing that he knew that. Yes, she did feel distinctly drawn to that feeling of his essence, but she didn’t like him being able to state that so matter-of-factly when she herself hadn’t even quite been able to articulate it yet.

“And I…cut that off when I…?”

“Yes,” he answered, again demonstrating that he knew what she was talking about even though she herself didn’t.

She skimmed over the surface of his mind in hers and couldn’t imagine it being gone again. It would be like a big, gaping hole, a wound in her psyche.

“Yes,” he agreed, startling her. “Exactly.”

“Are you reading my mind?” she objected heatedly.

“Not exactly. I’m not responding to words or ideas, just feelings. You can do it too. Aim for what I’m feeling.”

Hesitant and yet unable to keep herself from giving it a shot, she closed her eyes and quickly found that thread again. At its end, she was overwhelmed by the unfamiliarity of his mind.

“Just think of what you want to find.”

She did as he instructed, and one area promptly came forward, presenting itself to her consciousness. Reaching forward, she gasped as she felt a whole slew of emotions she couldn’t identify. But as she lingered there, as she became accustomed to the odd sensation, she found she could interpret the feelings as though they were her own, even though they clearly weren’t. She sensed an intense longing in conjunction with deep satisfaction. Confused by the contradiction, she gasped when she realized one was slightly behind the other, as though it were a memory.

“You missed me,” she breathed in amazement, her eyes snapping open.

“Very much,” he agreed.

Feeling an intense fluttering deep in her stomach, Rey panicked and instinctively pushed away from him, both physically and mentally. Slamming the barrier closed against him, she felt his essence instantly retract from her mind, leaving her feeling cold, incomplete.

“Rey,” he objected, leaning forward to seize her hand. “Please don’t do that.”

“No,” she cried, yanking her wrist out of his grip. “No, I don’t want you in my mind. And I don’t want to be in yours.”

“That’s not true,” he challenged, his eyes turning hard. “It’s not that you don’t want to, it’s that you’re afraid because you _do_ want to.”

“Stop that! Stop acting like you know me better than I do.”

“When you stop lying to yourself, I will!”

“About what? What am I lying about?”

“About me!”

“What about you?”

Instead of responding, he lunged at her. Falling back away from him in fright, he caught the back of her head in his hand as his body suspended over her. And, before she even realized she was back in his arms again, he was kissing her.

A tumult of emotions assailed her as she whimpered into his mouth. But as he took possession of her entirely, the whimper turned to a moan and she melted. Her hand sneaked up his back, pulling him closer, and he obliged by lowering himself against her entire length. Completely absorbed by the contact between them, Rey abruptly returned to her senses when one leg hitched up over his hip and she felt a distinct firmness at her core…

“No!” she cried, ripping her mouth away from his and pushing against him.

“That!” he stated firmly, pointing at her as he moved willingly back from her. “That right there. _That’s_ the lie.”

“What lie!?”

“That you don’t want me. That you never did. That the intensity you feel for me is not hatred at all.”

“But what?” she scoffed harshly. “Love?”

“No,” he admitted. “Right now it’s just lust, desire, need, longing. But it could be love. Probably. The potential is there. I can feel it. You could too, if you’d just stop being so damn stubborn!”

Rey turned away, a bit too fast because her head started pounding. She heard him sigh in frustration behind her, but she didn’t particularly care. Having never been drunk before, she hadn’t really known what to expect, but she was disappointed in the brevity of its effects. The pleasant ones, at least.

“Can you please let me help you with that?”

“With what?”

“Your headache.”

“How do you know I have a headache. You’re not in my head.”

“Rey,” he scolded gently. “It’s kind of obvious.”

She sighed, finally noticing her hand still pressed to her temple. “How can you help?”

When he moved toward her again, she matched his motion away. He sighed.

“I’m not going to kiss you again, alright? Unless you want me to.”

She scowled at him. “Headache,” she said, pointed to the specified body part.

With a nod, he crawled toward her once more and she allowed him to approach this time. She watched him closely as he placed his hands on either side of her head and closed his eyes. Knowing he could see her with neither his eyes nor his mind, she indulged herself in the opportunity to study him. His lashes were impossibly dark against the creamy white of his skin. A curl of his hair fell down across his forehead, and she felt the uncanny desire to brush it aside. Stifling the impulse, her gaze slid down his bent nose and to his wide, full mouth, the same one that had possessed hers only a moment again. She felt that pleasurable pang deep in her core again as she recalled that kiss and wondered if that really, truly was what she wanted. Watching absently as those lips pulled wide into a subtle smile, Rey only realized after he spoke that he’d caught her staring.

“Is that better?”

Blinking in confusion for a moment regarding what he was referring to, she suddenly realized the pain in her head was gone.

“How did you do that?”

He shrugged nonchalantly, settling back from her. “I eased the blood flow through your head.”

Forgetting to be annoyed by his arrogance, she asked tentatively, “Would I be able to…?”

“With proper instruction and practice, yes.”

Her lips pursed together with the reminder of his deep and abiding desire to train her, a reminder from earlier in the day in the hangar. She watched as he sighed in frustration.

“I want to tell you about something, but I need you to know it’s entirely the truth.”

She looked at him skeptically and he pointed at her.

“Exactly!” he exclaimed. “See? You can’t trust me, so how can you trust it’s the truth? So I want you to reach into my consciousness. You don’t need to look for anything just be there as I talk. And you can still block me from getting into your head. Alright?”

She hesitated, her eyes narrowing as she contemplated him.

“Please, Rey. This is important to me.”

With a sigh, she nodded and he smiled. Reaching toward him in her mind, she found she didn’t need to trace the thread she’d found before. His consciousness was wide open to her, and she found slipping inside to be the easiest thing in the world. Once there, she found the swirling brightness that was already becoming familiar to her. Checking to ensure that the barrier to her own mind was intact, she nodded her readiness.

“Okay. I’m going to tell a lie so you can feel what that’s like.”

“Alright,” she said, bracing herself to concentrate and catch whatever subtle difference might occur.

“I want to kill you.”

Rey flinched, although it wasn’t in reaction to his words. The sensation of swirling brightness had suddenly contracted, darkening significantly before finally returning to its normal state. She’d been prepared for a much more nuanced change, and therefore felt rather as if she’d been struck upside the head.

“Did you feel it?”

She nodded. “Is it always that strong of a difference? What if it’s a weaker lie?”

He smiled, as though he was proud of her for asking the question. “Let’s try it. I’m planning on kissing you again.”

Rey felt another constriction and darkening in his mind, not as intense or abrupt but still quite clear. She frowned.

“You didn’t sense it?” he asked, responding to her frown.

“No, I did, but I’m surprised that was a lie.”

He grinned, but only with one side of his mouth, a gesture she suddenly found wholly endearing.

“I’m not planning to kiss you, Rey. I aim to, I hope to, but I’m not _planning_ to.”

This time the bright swirling remained, perhaps even getting lighter and more buoyant. She thought to ask what that meant, but the satisfied smile on his face told her perhaps she didn’t really want to know.

“Alright,” she conceded. “What is it you want to tell me?”

“It’s a story. About me.”

She frowned her surprise, but didn’t say anything.

“I’d heard Snoke in my head for as long as I can remember. In my earliest memories, it was a comforting presence, a friend. But, slowly, over many years, he managed to insinuate himself between me and everyone else in my life, to convince me they wanted to change me. I was too solitary for my dad, too needy for my mom, too aggressive for my playmates, even too obnoxious for Chewie. And when my access to the Force developed, he convinced me everyone was afraid of me and that’s why my parents sent me to Luke’s academy, so they could be rid of me. There, all the kids hated me because I was stronger than them and they wanted me to be weaker. And you already know how Luke feared my darkness.

“I didn’t understand it then, but now I see how Snoke manipulated me all along. He made me feel alone and inadequate, that the only one who wanted me for who I was, not for something I couldn’t or didn’t want to be, was him. He both fed me the need to be loved for who I am, and denied me that from everyone in my life. Later, it was how he controlled me, denying me his affection, his acceptance until I did want he wanted.

“I wanted you to know that so you can fully understand what it means to me when I tell you… Rey, I don’t want to change you. My desire to train you is not to change who you are, to turn you to the Dark or the Light, but to give you the tools you need to make that decision for yourself. I just want to help you.”

At that, suddenly, Rey dropped her mouth open, but he quickly usurped her objection, belatedly recognizing the weak lie he’d just inadvertently told.

“Okay, alright… I don’t _just_ want to help you. I also want to see what you’re capable of.”

Rey narrowed her eyes at him. The sensation she was gathering from his mind let her know that he was telling the full truth this time, but she found it wasn’t enough for her.

“Why?” she asked. “Why do you want to see what I’m capable of?”

“Well…” he hesitated, cocking that lopsided grin at her as he obligingly answered her question with full honesty. “Frankly, because it turns me on.”

Rey gasped, both at the riot of sensations his words drove through her body, and at the sudden flare of brilliance she sensed from his mind. She suddenly recalled the expression on his face when she’d forcibly removed him from her mind in the interrogation room on Starkiller Base, then when she’d called his grandfather’s lightsaber to her hand, then when she’d beat him in an admittedly unfair fight in the snowy forest… She’d never understood his reactions to her in those moments, and now she found clarity there. Moved by an impulse she didn’t truly understand, she reached toward him and touched her fingertips to the scar she’d left on his face. She sensed a tightening in his mind, but of a different sort than when he lied. Belated recognizing it as an emotion, she realized he was overcome by desire, longing, affection… All for _her_.

Withdrawing suddenly from both his face and his mind, Rey turned aside, not knowing how to deal with what she was learning from him.

“Is this how you convinced your mother you were sincere when you approached her with your plan?”

“No,” he answered quickly. “I can’t do this with anyone else.”

She frowned. “Then why does it work for you and me?”

“Actually, the answer is the same way I was able to convince Mom. I told her that you and I have a bond in the Force.”

Rey rolled her eyes. “That was just Snoke—”

“No,” he insisted emphatically, the intensity of his gaze conveying the urgency with which he spoke now. “It wasn’t him. It was there before him, he just…connected it. It had been severed. I don’t know why or how, but he reestablished it. That’s why it’s still there after he died.”

“But he said…”

“Rey… I didn’t believe him. Why did you?”

She turned away, thinking back on it and forcing herself to confront a truth she’d never wanted to before. “Because I wanted to believe it was his doing.”

“Because if it wasn’t him…?”

“Then it was you. And me.”

He only smiled at her and she cleared her throat uncomfortably.

“So that was it?” she asked. “For your mother? Just that we have a Force bond?”

“No. I told her your Light had spent the last year infecting me, even though you’d shut me out. I’d spent that year trying to reach you, to reconnect. But you were always so bent on destroying me. I could sense the Darkness growing in you, Rey. Your obsession to destroy me was infecting you. So I knew I couldn’t reach you that way. And the only other way was to come home.

“But I couldn’t just leave. There were too many advantages in place, too many redundancies. If I left the First Order then, someone else would just take over in my stead. I’d come to realize the war needed to end and that the Resistance needed to win. So I devised a way I could help make that happen.”

“So you’ve spent the last year sabotaging and murdering your own followers.”

Ren bowed his head, clearly not proud of his actions. “It’s no worse than what I was doing before in the name of the First Order,” he defended himself. “And this time at least I had a reason—a _good_ reason to do it.”

“To end the war.”

“No. Ending the war was incidental. My motivation was to save you.”

Rey blinked, stunned. “Me?!”

“The last time we fought, do you remember? You came at me without hesitation, so much hatred leeching off you I could _feel_ it. You nearly destroyed me, Rey, would have cut me in half just like Snoke if I hadn’t managed to deactivate your saber in time. And in that moment, after I’d escaped you, I saw your eyes glow yellow. That’s the Dark Side, Rey. It was only an instant, a fleeting moment, but I knew what would happen if we kept going the way we were, that eventually you _would_ kill me and you would be lost to your Darkness. That’s what convinced Mom to commit to my plan, that it was about you. I think that may have been the first time she’d ever heard me worry myself over anyone besides myself.”

She nodded. “And that’s why you swore her to secrecy, so she wouldn’t tell me.”

“I needed to tell you myself,” he agreed.

“What if I still want to kill you?” she demanded darkly.

To her surprise, he smiled. “I have a solution for that, too.”

“Yeah? And that is?”

“Sex.”

Rey choked. “What?!”

“Have sex with me. Channel your Dark energies into passion instead of rage. They’re both Dark emotions, much more closely related than most realize. Punish me for my crimes by tormenting me and let me torment you in turn. No one kills, no one dies, no one is lost to their Darkness… And I, for one, would certainly enjoy it. I’ve only been thinking about it for almost three years—”

“Stop!” she growled in frustration. “Is this really just a huge ploy to get into my pants?”

“No. That’s just a fringe benefit.”

To her horror, Rey suddenly realized she wanted to kiss that smirk off his face.

“Rey… Sex is the real reason why the Jedi banned attachments. It wasn’t love at all, except that it leads to sex. What they never got is that Force users were never meant to be all Dark or all Light. Such extremes are unnatural. Nature is balance. The Force needs balance within nature, within its users. The balance the Force sought was never between Light and Dark sides of the Force, but between Light and Dark sides of Force _users_. Sex is a highly useful way of achieving that balance because it dips into the Dark without risking primarily Light users.”

Rey shook her head. “Where did you learn all this? Snoke?”

“ _Hell_ , no. Snoke was as Dark and evil as they come. There was no Light in him at all, only the illusion of it when it served his purposes. Snoke never thought of anyone but himself, and that kind of selfishness is even Darker than passion. And I certainly never learned this from Luke. Even though they had largely died out by the time he became aware of his Force sensitivity, Luke trained and steeped himself in the old ways of the Jedi. He learned what he could from Obi-Wan and Yoda, then went in search of Jedi relics to fill in the blanks. He never _listened_. He never _felt_.”

“Listened to what?”

“To nature. To himself. To others. The Force binds all life. And if you’re willing to listen, life has all those answers. But if you ascribe to the Jedi, then you think you already have the answers and you don’t listen. You think taking an emotionally unstable boy away from his parents to train with Jedi Knights is what’s best for him, to give him the message that all that’s really important about him is his access to the Force. And you think that’s best simply because that’s the way it’s always been done when, in fact, it could be the worst possible thing for him. And, yes, that was true of me, but it was also true—maybe even more so—of my grandfather, Anakin.

“He was a direct creation of the Force. Did you know that, Rey? The Force gave him directly to his mother, conceived him in her womb with no father at all, entirely hers. _She_ could have been his balance, her love for her son tempering his Dark tendencies. He always would have had a higher capacity for Darkness, just like I do. But with her there to guide him, to love him, the Darkness never would have taken over. Or, at least…that’s my theory.”

“So your mother was supposed to be your balance?”

“No, I don’t think she could be. For one, she was too concerned with politics, her career. That’s not a bad thing usually, but for the mother of a Dark-leaning Force sensitive…? Not a good combination. That, and I think her history with her father made her more paranoid, more afraid of what she sensed in me. She couldn’t deal with it, was too afraid of screwing up and turning me into Darth Vader. She thought Luke could do better than she could, and she was wrong. He had the same hang ups, the same fears. And, while his moment of weakness may truly have been only a moment, it was enough to set off a scared fifteen-year-old boy.”

“So…who was supposed to be your balance, then?”

“Oh, Rey, don’t you know by now?” he murmured, reaching forward impetuously and taking her hand in his. “We have a bond that usually only happens between Master and Apprentice, or close family members. And yet our has always been there. You are Light dominant, but I bring out the Darkness in you. I am Dark dominant, but you bring out the Light in me. We slip inside each others minds so effortlessly, and we’re instinctually drawn to each other in a way most people never experience. Do you want to deny any of that, Rey?”

“But…” Rey hesitated, swallowing her anxiety down hard. “What if I can’t? What if I’m not strong enough to balance you?”

Ben smiled and reached forward to stroke her cheek. “Sweetheart, if I’m right, being with me, balancing me will be the easiest thing you’ve ever done.”

She stared, transfixed by his gaze, his voice, the light touch of his fingertip, and she slowly realized she wanted to believe him.

“Open up for me, sweetheart.”

At first she didn’t know what he meant, then his finger gently stroked the side of her forehead. And, anxiously, Rey lifted the barrier against his mind. He came in slowly, cautious against overwhelming her too suddenly. She watched as his eyes closed in an expression of sheer bliss as their minds merged, filling in the blank spaces that were so easy to overlook when empty but so present and obvious when filled. She heard his breath catch in his throat as he sought out her emotions and found her building desire for him. Following his lead, she focused there, sensing her own emotions from within, willing herself to confront them honestly, and she found she had long been attracted to him, since the first time he’d removed his helmet during her interrogation on Starkiller Base. And she suddenly remember his words to her on that occasion, words that had only perplexed and frightened her at the time, and which she now recognized as his early recognition of what lay between them. Locked into the same stream of thought, she felt Ben smile as he repeated those same words.

“Don’t be afraid. I feel it too.”

Afraid of the implications of her instinctual attraction, she had willfully transferred what she felt for him from passion to anger, and from anger to hatred. Now, she traced it backward, acknowledging what had attracted her in the first place. His depthless eyes, his generous mouth, his waving hair, his height, his breadth, his power, his dignity, his voice. And, now, she could add to that his intuitive contemplations on nature and the Force, his insight into the Jedi’s mistakes and how to correct them, his embracing of both Light and Dark and recognition of the need for both, his intelligence, his generosity, his determination, his dedication. And as she delved deeper and deeper into his mind, experiencing more of his essence, she found her own truth.

“I’m not afraid anymore, Ben.”

She heard him groan deeply at her words, and only belated realized she had called him by his given name. Suddenly, Kylo Ren seemed alien, an assumed identity that would never again fit him, and she heard him groan again, deeper and louder.

“Rey,” he rasped, his voice strained. “I need you.”

She gasped, incredibly turned on by his words. Her body was responding to him in ways she never knew it could, and she didn’t want to deny herself the exploration of these new sensations. But, still, she hesitated.

“Is there a reason we should wait?” she asked.

Ben focused on her and she could sense his answer in his mind. _I’ve already waited two and a half years. But I’ll wait as long as you want me to_.

“No,” she answered her own question. “Come get me.”

He wasted no time in fulfilling her directive. They met on their knees, bodies pressed together as mouths tangled and arms embraced. Rey could already feel Ben’s erection, and she pressed against him, delighting in the lightheaded sensation her subtle movement flooded through him. Bold and unafraid, she moved her hand between their bodies, wanting to know more definitively what the physical manifestation of his arousal felt like. The moment she touched him, tracing the outlines of his engorged manhood through his pants, he reared back, his face stretching for the stars, mouth opened in a silent cry.

He pulled away from her suddenly, his mind suffused with the need to show her how he could make her body sing. Rey felt his essence envelope her, and she was spun swiftly but gently around, her back pressed against his chest. As his arms encased her, the Force essence dissipated until it was only his body against hers once more. Her head lolled to the side as he kissed and nibbled along her neck and up behind her ear. She shuddered in delight as her hands reached behind, one up to tangle in his hair, and one down to clutch at his ass, encouraging him to press his hardon against her rear. His hands, meantime, roamed all over her body after discarding the restrictive belt she wore. Her clothing now hanging loose about her, his hands ventured beneath, finding skin with a shuddering breath at her ear. Rey moaned and pressed back closer into him as one hand found her breast, smoothing over its gentle slope and flicking at the hardened bud of her nipple. Leaning her head back onto his shoulder and turning so she could feel his hair tickling her nose, Rey breathed his name, her tongue darting out to touch the tip of his earlobe.

“More,” she whispered, the haze of passion already having claimed her utterly. “Ben… More.”

In response, she felt his hands fumbling at her pants, seeking to burrow up under her tunic then down beneath her waistband. Having finally encountered the flesh he sought, his hand moved down into the thatch of hair at the juncture of her thighs. Moaning wantonly, Rey felt her core contracting pleasurably in anticipation of his touch. She gasped when his fingertips grazed over the lowest part of her, responding as silently directed when a nudge at her thigh requested more space to maneuver. As soon as she spread her knees wider, Ben took up the space she created for him, his fingers making their first contact with the most sensitive folds at her core. Gasping again, she heard him moan her name at her ear.

“Oh, Rey… Do you feel how wet you are for me?”

She could only gasp and utter a strangled cry when his fingers finally dipped inside her, drawing her moisture outward to coat her folds. Diving in with a long, drawn out groan, Ben pressed one finger deep inside her and Rey cried out. When he withdrew, she had a moment of desperate panic, thinking that was all there was, but then he pressed back inside with two fingers. Rey pressed her hips back into his, pulling Ben forward with her to keep his chest in contact with her back. She felt him brush against something that made her whimper with a sudden intense pleasure, her mewling sounds intensifying as his other hand moved directly against her clit while his fingers continued driving inside her.

Already building inexorably toward her climax, Ben nevertheless withdrew, his Force enveloping her again as he moved her gently to the grass on her back. Seizing the waistband of her pants, he drew them down her legs, exposing the golden expanse of her skin to the moonlight, even as she flung aside her shirt. Grasping her thighs, he drew them wide then plunged his mouth at their apex. Rey cried out full voiced now, her fingers tangling in his hair as he licked and sucked and nipped at her lips and clit. Releasing one leg, he drove his fingers inside her again, wriggling his finger tips at the rough spot deep inside. Her breathing coming in both heaving and shallow gasps at the same time, she felt the culmination of her pleasure approaching like a massive wave, enveloping her body first slowly then crashing down upon her as her core tightened around Ben’s fingers and she cried out over and over.

Leaving her only as long as he had to, Ben looked down on her incredibly sexy, fully naked figure, her legs spread wide and her lips quivering with the attention he’d just shown them. Her eyes, dark with passion and desire, looked up at him as we swiftly threw aside his shirt and worked his way into his pants. Momentarily distracted by his awkward maneuverings to rid himself of his garments, he called out in surprise and pleasure when Rey’s hand suddenly encased his rock hard erection. Throwing his head back in exquisite agony, he pressed into her grip then cried out again when he felt her lips close over the head of his cock. Unable to endure the wait any longer, he pushed Rey’s shoulders back, her mouth coming off him with an audible pop, and he caught her with his Force to lay her back down gently into the matted down grass.

Wasting no further time, he seized her legs, spread them wide, lined himself up with her opening, and pressed himself home in one fluid motion. His moan of exquisite pleasure mingled with hers and he checked with her through their bond to ensure she was in no pain. Finding only pleasure, he began to move, slowly at first, then encouraged to speed and force through the feedback he received directly from her consciousness. Soon, he was driving into her hard, each thrust eliciting a yelp from her and a grunt from him. He felt her core tightening around him, driving him to new heights of ecstasy, and he listened to her climax for the second time, only then crying out with his own release as he spilled himself deep inside her. Pushing deep in just a few more times, he cried out in surprise as another orgasm gripped her and, in turn, gripped him.

Smiling like a fool and chuckling softly, Ben listened to the adorable little sounds she made as he slowly lengthened his strokes, working them both down gently. Pulling her with him, he suddenly rolled over onto his back, carrying her upward so she lay draped and languid across him, her body still pulsing around his sated cock. He held her close, kissing the slope of her neck. Eventually, she slipped off him and snuggled down under his arm, her head on his chest,

“Ben?” she said after a long, sustained silence.

“Yes, sweetheart,” he answered, his hand languidly stroking her side.

“I think I like the Dark side of the Force.”

He laughed, rolling toward her. Meeting her smile and affectionate gaze, he kissed her, eager to share more of that Darkness with her.


End file.
